I have a legal question I hope someone can answer. If a client hires me for an email marketing campaign and I'm the one who goes out and gets all their customers to voluntary give me their email address, do those email addresses belong to me or to the client? I'm thinking that those addresses become my proprietary information since the client did not find them or supply them to me (they don't even have ONE customer email address and they don't have the time or experience to come up with ways to acquire them).

One of the reasons I'm asking this question is because I want to provide a service of building email lists for companies and sending opt-in mailings to their customers for them on a regular basis for a monthly fee. If I fork over all the addresses, the clients could just take over the project themselves after it's all set up and there goes my income stream.

Does anyone know the answer to this question? If my hunch is correct, what wording could I use on the client contract to make this very clear?

Thanks!

If the client is paying you to harvest the list, that list and its contents are those of the clients. It would be on the same lines as having access to all their current and future contacts, it belongs to them and them only. Do they have a sign up or lead capture process on their site? You may want to suggest this to them so that their list starts to build itself. But then again, the process will automate itself.

If you want to start list building for sale you will need to do it on your own terms and then sell them the list.

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Lee Drozak
My Office Assistant

It surprises me that this question should even be asked. Why would you build a contact list for someone else unless they were to be the owners of the list? Why would you build a list for someone else and then want to keep the list, unless you and the other person are clones of one another and in the exact same business?

If you're working with inbound marketing, anyway, I think you have to understand that your list IS your business, and it's built on your brand, very specifically. If it's transferable to someone else, it's not a very strong list, really is not of much value.

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Mary H. Ruth/Virtual Writing & Communications
http://www.writingVA.com

They would by law be the owners because you were being paid to compile that information.

Originally Posted by virtual writing

It surprises me that this question should even be asked. Why would you build a contact list for someone else unless they were to be the owners of the list? Why would you build a list for someone else and then want to keep the list, unless you and the other person are clones of one another and in the exact same business?

As I mentioned, "If I fork over all the addresses, the clients could just take over the project themselves after it's all set up and there goes my income stream."

This is why I need to keep the list:

The main way I plan to get email addresses is I'm going to set up a box in their shop with a sign that says something to the effect of 'Join our email club and receive exclusive discounts, coupons, and special offers from XYZ Sandwich Shop.' Customers will fill out the entry form which contains a permission statement to receive emails from the shop. Then I'll create and send out mailings each month (or however often the shop desires) to everyone who signed up. I'll charge a monthly fee for this service.

It will involve plenty of time and energy to consult with each shop, customize their box, pick up the slips at regular intervals, enter all those email addresses into a database, compose ad copy, manage the list, send the emails, etc. So my huge concern, of course, is that I'll put all that time and energy into getting this program set up for a shop and then if I give them all the email addresses they could just take over the project themselves since I would have basically just HANDED them this great idea plus an entire turnkey system ... why would they need to pay me a monthly fee to do the mailings?

So, I would be obtaining information from people who come into the shop that the business owner does not already have. I would be turning those slips into an email list. I will be their email marketing department. So that's why I'm leaning toward the conclusion that the email addresses are mine. But I want to make sure it's not just logical, but that it's legal too. I need to find a source to guide me. I'm not familiar with how this works because this is a new venture.

I agree that the shop owners would own the list for all the reasons listed here.

My take is that you are offering a turnkey service...that's the service. What you want is ongoing service and support. I see these as two separate service options.

To me this is like creating a website for someone such as Wordpress and then letting the client maintain the site themselves. Afterall, WP is known, as you know to be relatively user-friendly. The job ends there or some VAs offer a maintenance package with that WP site. If the client wants the site updated, they would then pay for the ongoing service as an option.

You ask why they would bother paying you a monthly fee for handling the mailings? Well, it is true they can do it themselves but then why would they if you can do it for them. My thought is that once you set the system up, you may be asked to continue to input the information into the database. But if they decide to do it themselves, then you have already been paid for providing a solution to a problem and the job ends.

I would suggest that you create packages. The first package would be the actual set up and getting started package. Then you are paid for that service.

I would suggest offering the ongoing service as an add-on and something that is optional. I know this is not what you want.

You say that you will put in all this time and energy in creating the database for the shops but you are getting paid, right, for that time and energy?

I do not believe that a client will agree to you owning the email addresses anyway so you may have a problem promoting that idea.

Good luck!

Janine

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I agree that you may want to have a 2-part service, the initial set-up and then the follow-up. However whichever route you take, the list is still that of the client. They are paying you for the service, the box is in their store and the customers need to physically be in the location fill out the information.

As for them doing it themselves, look at it from this perspective: If it was that easy for them, they would be currently doing this themselves. So to keep the project ongoing offer support like Janine has suggested. Why would they want to pay you to build a list and then go and sell it to everyone else? Now see it from the clients end, it would be more cost effective to pay someone else to do this and then they could concentrate on all the new customers it will bring it. That is what you sell, the support end and you will end up with a regular client.

One thing you should remember is that we are a service industry and there are times that clients come and go on projects just as this. You need to find a way to turn those projects into a steady income stream without compromising client proprietary rights.

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Lee Drozak
My Office Assistant

Originally Posted by zippy1

So, I would be obtaining information from people who come into the shop that the business owner does not already have. I would be turning those slips into an email list. I will be their email marketing department. So that's why I'm leaning toward the conclusion that the email addresses are mine. But I want to make sure it's not just logical, but that it's legal too. I need to find a source to guide me. I'm not familiar with how this works because this is a new venture.

Simply by virtue of your collecting the information does not make it in any way yours. If a business has hired you to convert information obtained from their clients and their business, that email list belongs to that business. Think of it another way, without that business and those walk-ins, you wouldn't have a list, so how can you possibly imagine that the list would belong to you?

The only way you could do this is by 1) getting the business owner to agree in writing that the email addresses you are collecting are not theirs, but belong to your business (thereby allowing you potentially to do anything you want with that list including selling it to their competitors) and 2) by making it absolutely clear to anyone giving out their email information that they are in fact, not giving it to that business, but instead to a third-party which is yourself.

I think you've been given some excellent advice by Lee and Janine regarding selling differing packages that incorporate services around maintaining the list, but I would steer clear of trying to justify owning a list that has clearly been obtained by another business.

Good luck!

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Kate V. Kerans
Kerans Virtual Assistance

WOW, I just love this place so much!! Thanks everyone for setting me straight on this. It makes total sense that the client owns and should have access to the customer email addresses.

I am ecstatic about the idea of creating packages. That totally solves my problem and puts my concerns to rest. I never would have thought of that, it's a perfect solution. There will be a start up kit for a certain price and then different levels of plans depending on how many emails they need sent out and how often. Plus a few other add-on options too. I'll encourage them to sign up for a plan but will let them decide. For skeptics, I'll offer an incentive to get a plan, like a discount (with an expiration date). They may discover that it's harder or more time consuming then they imagined and hopefully will change their mind and be glad to pay me to do it for them. I'll play up my writing, editing, marketing, and typing skills and the fact that I have plenty of time to devote to the project so as to nudge them in this direction.

I'm excited to get this started. I'm grateful for the input you guys!!